“APPALLING to see the war in Ukraine being exploited … for cheap political points”. Those are the words of Tory MSP Miles Briggs.
“Ukraine is not a tool to advance a political narrative.” Those are from his colleague, Jeremy Balfour.
“These people are becoming increasingly detached from reality. Utterly deranged.” And those were written by Jamie Halcro Johnston, the Conservative Highlands and Islands MSP.
👇 Appalling to see the war in Ukraine being exploited by the SNP for cheap political points. https://t.co/pgZpucNmw1
— Miles Briggs MSP (@Miles4Lothian) March 1, 2022
We could list more Tories who were up in arms with self-righteous outrage in March after SNP president Michael Russell said “the right of people to choose how they are governed and by whom is an absolute and must be universally applied”, whether that be in Ukraine or Scotland.
Murdo Fraser, Annie Wells, Dean Lockhart, and Douglas Lumsden all joined their colleagues on the bandwagon, leaping to condemn what they claimed was the use of Ukraine as a political tool.
On Wednesday however, those normally clamorous voices fell silent as their leader, Douglas Ross, shamelessly invoked images of innocent Ukrainian children being buried in shallow graves in order to defend his law-breaking boss.
Boris Johnson, who flouted the Covid laws which he had put in place, should not be removed due to the war in Ukraine, Ross told us.
READ MORE: Douglas Ross 'destroys any remaining credibility' with car crash BBC interview
The Scots Tory leader went one step further. He said would not call for Johnson to resign as that could create instability in the UK (god knows it’s been “strong and stable” in recent years) and he “will do nothing to help and support a war criminal like Putin”.
The implication is that those who have called for Johnson to go – like the person who he stood beside on the campaign trail on Wednesday, Ruth Davidson – are aiding the Russian regime in their genocidal war.
To the Tories, linking two nations’ sovereignty is unforgivable, but using the deaths of children to defend their law-breaking boss is all in a day’s work.
The Prime Minister of the United Kingdom broke the law. The idea that keeping him in post is the opposite to what Putin wants is laughable.
If the corrupt and morally bankrupt Russian regime wants anything, it’s for the governments of the nations which oppose it to also be morally compromised.
Disinformation pumped out by the Kremlin takes root best when it begins from a seed of truth. If they want to present the UK Government as unfit to lead, the Tories are handing them enough kernels for the whole sowing season.
Any arguments that Johnson is anything but a liability fly in the face of reality.
This piece is an extract from today’s REAL Scottish Politics newsletter, which is emailed out at 7pm every weekday with a round-up of the day's top stories and exclusive analysis from the Wee Ginger Dug - although The Jouker has filled in for him today.
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